Why the Post Office was able to bring private prosecutions in the Horizon IT scandal

• That the Post Office was able to bring so many prosecutions – and to conduct them so appallingly – is because the company was not supervised.
• Just as any other public company or private citizen might, the Post Office brought private prosecutions.
• As co-directors of the Criminal Law Reform Now Network, we have been working on a review of private prosecutions since 2019.

How private prosecutions are brought

• To bring a private prosecution, a person or company asks a magistrate to issue a summons against the accused person.
• When the accused person answers the summons, an ordinary criminal case ensues – not a civil case.
• This is one duty which the Post Office manifestly declined to perform, as has been highlighted by statutory inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal.

Safeguards for private prosecutions

• There has long been the possibility for the director of public prosecutions (DPP) – who, since 1986, is the head of the CPS – to take over a private prosecution or discontinue it.
• Since 2009, the policy has been to discontinue private prosecutions which do not meet the same core standards (that there be a realistic prospect of prosecution or that a prosecution is in the public interest) with which the CPS must comply.
• However, it would normally be up to the accused person themselves to ask that the DDP or CPS should take it over, and the decision would still be made on the basis of the files in the possession of the private prosecutor.

Private prosecutions should be reformed, not abolished

• It is important not to look at private prosecutions entirely through the prism of the Post Office scandal.
• Where wealthy and determined victims have the means to investigate and prosecute effectively, they may, in fact, be doing a public service.
• Some succesful private prosecutions have led to confiscation orders being made against convicted defendants that have resulted in millions of pounds being handed over to the Treasury.
• In recent years, many legal firms specialising in private prosecutions have formed their own Private Prosecutors’ Association.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.